The Girl in Room 17
by GoddamnWrite
Summary: Santana Lopez is just your ordinary type of broad, scratching out a living at the New Directions Hotel. It's rough, she's tough and there ain't nothing that's gonna change. That is, until Tina Cohen-Chang turns up dead in her room... [1940's AU Noir.]
1. Chapter 1

**The Girl in Room 17  
Part I**

A murder. That's what Hummel had said. The singer, Cohen-Chang, had been found in her suite. A blow to her head had turned the cream carpet into a red river. Well, according to Hummel, anyway.

Not our first murder, no. But New Directions wasn't exactly The Grand Hotel. You came here to hold afloat for a few months before you decided to let go after all, and let the waves take you.

Me? I'm a strong swimmer.

I leaned back, framed them, put it on the wall and looked them over fine. It was like a cent had been dropped in Hooverville. Limbs, faces, blurs. The lobby was steaming.

"When can we get out of here?" That was Room 106. The soul singer, Jones. She was pretty big. In every sense.

"This is ridiculous. I have a good mind to get my lawyer down here. You can't do this!" Room 56. Berry, the Ballerina. Passing us little people on the way down.

"Calm down. They probably have a good reason." Hudson was it? Her husband. But not for long. Not if what Hummel said about his visits to Room 98 were true. There she was now. Fabray. Watching him with her too long eyelashes, ringless fingers rubbing over a full belly. She moved back, as if hoping the wall would swallow her whole. It wasn't hungry. Hard to keep an appetite in this place.

"Can you believe this?" Hummel asked, leaning against the counter and playing with the bell. "They've shut us down."

"They're flushing him out." I observed my nails. "But in this place? They may not be ready for what they turn over."

Hummel wasn't listening. He didn't care for me and I wasn't exactly writing to the fan pages about him either. I followed his gaze, lingering on one of our newest additions. Room 109, Anderson. The composer. It was quite a view and I could understand the appreciation, especially since he was fixing his eyes on Room 10, Jesse St. James. An actor from New York. He'd left there with plans to climb to the top. He got his wish, except the heights he was scaling was the letter H, right behind Entwistle.

"You wanting to take him up more towels?" I asked. "How do you know he is even catching for your team?"

He blushed. I could see why the guests liked him when he got flustered like that. Especially the older, male ones.

"You ladies got nothing better to do?" Karofsky. He loomed over us, delighting in the cast of his shadow. "I don't pay you girls to lounge around and gossip about Gregory Peck, you know."

"Nerts! You barely pay us," Hummel snorted. Smart mouth. Shy eyes. "What did the bulls say?"

Karofsky tightened his lip and held on to his words, staring Hummel over. I hated that look. I wanted to slap it from his head and watch it slide down the wall. I closed my eyes instead. "None of your bees wax, Sweetheart. Go see if any of the guests need anything. This could go on all night."

Hummel buried his gaze on the ground and gave a jerk of his head. A red blossomed around his neck like an infant day. He started forward, Anderson drawing him like he was the moon and Hummel was water.

"Fairy," Karofsky muttered watching him go. As always the gaze was too long. I wondered about that. I wonder about a lot of things.

"I guess later is off," I said.

"You guess right, baby." He smoothed a finger down my arm. I swallowed the repulsion. An acquired taste. "But maybe we can get away later? After they interview everyone?"

"Maybe. I might go home. Wash my hair, look at my watch and then wash it again."

He pulled his lips back and tried to lick them. His fists clenched. "Why don't I fire you?"

I moved closer, eating into his personal space. "The same reason you promoted me?" A finger found his collar and slipped inside, brushing clammy skin. His palm let the fingers go.

His eyes darted over my shoulder. "Yeah. You think they'll find him? The killer?"

"I think they'll have a fun time looking."

"What about the lame? Didn't he used to pitch woo with the gal?"

I turned, my breath hitching in my throat like a dam. Room 17. Abrams. He sat in his chair, his head clutched in his hands with hair entwining his fingers angrily. He looked like a man going down for the third and final time.

But the man didn't interest me. Not as much as the girl at his side did. She clutched his shoulder, comfort in every pore. Her white skin bled into the dark of his shirt, red tipped nails gleaming like promises as she soothed. Her eyes rose and found mine, blue reaching out to brown. A smile hovered at her lips, and then changed its mind at last second.

_Her_. The girl in Room 17. With _him._

I turned away.

"How'd a duck like that get a dame like her?"

I rolled my shoulders and bit my tongue. "How does anyone get anyone these days?"

"Mr. Karofsky?" A tall drink of water for sure. One I could quench my thirst with. Strong jaw, almond skin and soft eyes. He would have looked nice fifty foot in black and white and dipping Lana Turner. But all he had was us. "You the manager?"

Karofsky stood up straight. "I am. I run this place for Schuester. I didn't catch your name?"

"I didn't throw it." He turned to me. "And Ms-?"

"Lopez. Santana Lopez." Karofsky answered. "She's our receptionist. She takes the names. The calls."

"She speaks, too."

The newcomer smiled. His eyes took a wander down to my front and set up anchor. I let him. Everyone needs a warm place to lay their hat.

"Detective Puckerman. I'm here about the murder."

"I didn't think you were here for the rates." I reached into my pocket and pulled out my smokes. "Puckerman?" I said, "That right."

"They call me Puck."

"And you can't get them to stop?" I smiled and touched a flame to a tip. _"Puck._" I let my tongue savour and taste the letters. "I don't know anything."

"Oh, I find that hard to believe, Frail. You look like you took plenty home from school." He gave a breezy grin, one he had been practising since he abandoned short pants. It was designed to make me pick up my skirts and faint.

I'm not the fainting type.

"What exactly do you want to know, Detective?" Karofsky sneered politely. "And how long are you going to hold up my hotel?"

Puck didn't give him his attention. That was all for me. "As long as it takes. Dangle, Karofsky. I'll catch up with you later. Let me jar with your gal here."

"I'm not his girl," I said simply. When Karofsky was gone. "I'm no one's girl."

"I had a feeling you weren't, Glamour." His face turned serious. "Do you want to tell me about your guests?"

"Is that a question? Or are you just making nice and letting me think I have a choice."

He chose air for his answer.

"Fine. Where do you want to start?"

"Cohen-Chang was killed a little over an hour ago. That's when your house dick reported it at least. She took a blow here." He touched at the back of his head. "And that's the last thing she took." He waited to still if I was going to need smelling salts. Satisfied I was going nowhere, he nodded. "The weak sister? The bell hop with the Kraut name?"

"Kurt Hummel."

"He says that no one has checked out. So, all we are trying to do, Ms. Lopez, is see if any heads are missing."

I gave a glance around the room. Pretending that one of those faces didn't eclipse the rest. "Everyone's here that I can see."

He furrowed his brows at that. "This is _everyone_?"

"You may not be aware of yet, Puck, but this isn't exactly the cream of the crop. This is where the misfits come when they get tired of the sound of a slamming door."

"I get it. I get it. So, while Hummel did the checking in, where were you?"

I pressed a hand into my pocket, fingers closing round the item. "I had an errand to run."

"May I ask what errand was that?"

"You can ask. Asking's free." I sighed. "I barely knew the girl. I didn't kill her."

"No one said you did!" He introduced his brows with his hairline. "Now why would you say a thing like that?"

I stubbed out my smoke on the battered wood. "I was in my post for about ten minutes before she was found. Then you and your friends arrived. I didn't see anything."

He turned the checking in book around. "Maybe you can help me here? Give me a feel for your guests? Let's start with Anderson, Blaine?"

"Too square to fit in your round peg."

"Is that right?"

"Plus, I've never seen them exchange words. Let alone blows."

"Maybe he liked the look of her? And she wasn't forthcoming?"

I smiled, glancing over at Hummel wiping imaginary lint from Anderson's shoulders. At the distance between them that was close enough for dancing. "Maybe."

"Berry, Finn and Rachel?"

"That's them." I pointed outward. "George and Lenny." He followed my gaze and found the two. Berry was playing with his tie and grinning up at him like he was everything. Hudson stared down with the same fervour. If you didn't look too closely you'd miss his eyes searching the crowd. I know those eyes. They'll always be searching. No matter how many times they find it.

"I know her. She's the ballerina, right? That had the bad fall?"

"Never dance again they say."

"They say a lot of things. Few it worth a damn. And the tower next to her?"

"Finn Hudson. Her husband."

"And he took her name?" He scrunched up his face as if something foul lay on his tongue. "_Putz_."

"They weren't pally with Cohen-Chang either. Not enough to beat in her head, anyway." I wrapped a hand around the book and dragged it back. "And neither were Evans, Fabray, Jones, St. James-"

"Jones? Okay, what about her?" He turned, leaning his elbows on the desk and staring out to the bustle like a man on the deck of his own boat. "What's her story?"

"Lady Arbuckle? One of the few that don't belong in this joint. She's been here about a month. Next month? She'll be dancing around Gillespie."

He gave a dip of his head. "This place is quite-_progressive_?"

I stiffened. "People can't afford to have prejudices here, Puck."

He shrugged. "It's not my world, Ms. Lopez."

"But you're happy to live in it, aren't you?"

"Don't be sore." He held up his hands. "I was stating a fact."

"I suppose you want to know why I'm behind this counter and not cleaning it."

His face hardened like a cake left overnight. "You have me wrong, Ms. Lopez. I get the feeling you have a lot of people wrong. You like that. You can keep your distance that way. And then you can have a high time telling yourself that's not_your_fault. It's theirs."

"Well, you've certainly given my feeble little mind a lot to think about." I raised an eyebrow. "Are we done?"

He looked at me as if he would like to sock me the jaw and not have to worry about it. "Hummel says that Ms. Cohen-Chang was friendly with Artie Abrams. You know anything about that?"

"Sure. They were going together for a spell. They've both been here over a year now, checked in around the same time. It fizzled out. Most things do. You don't like him for this, do you?"

"Just because a man sits down for a living doesn't mean that he doesn't reach for the moon once in awhile."

"And your motive?"

He took hold of his right ear and worried it. "Maybe he and Cohen-Chang found their spark again? Maybe she wanted to tell people. And maybe he didn't like that?"

I showed him my teeth. "Take a look at that girl. The blonde." He did. "Useless legs or not, you don't step out on that. Would you?"

He whistled. "I'd like the chance to try."

"Plus, Marlowe, how did he get down the stairs in time? The word is the girl has been dead less than an hour. He was here when the house dick found her. Wheeling up and down, putting chips in our flooring. And our elevator's out."

But not the side elevator. That one worked just fine.

"Okay. Staff? I can't exactly see Hummel leaving a body behind. That type have no steel in their spine-"

"You think murder is something to aspire to?"

"-Karofsky? Maybe. No motive that I know of. But he looks the type." He turned to me, his grin slipping sideways. "You?"

I opened my my mouth with the idea of saying something. I let it pass

"Did anyone see you make your errand?"

It felt like a stab. "No."

"Ah, well." He stood up straight and gave the rim of his hat a tap. "We'll get to that. I'll talk to you later, Ms. Lopez."

"I'll be here. Furiously counting down the seconds."

He reached out a hand and grazed a knuckle over my bracelet. "That's a lovely. Did the lug who runs the joint buy it?"

"It's cheap. I have one to every day of the week."

"You don't take compliments well, do you?"

"I have quite a collection. I've yet to find a use for them. Will that be all?"

"Hell. You're nothing but ice." He shook his head. "Nothing but ice."

I watched him walk away. Slow. The walk of the man with all the time in the world. I wondered what that was like. Because I was running out.

With a deep breath, I stepped away from my desk and made my way over to the others.

I made my way over to _her._


	2. Chapter 2

**The Girl in Room 17  
Part II**

Rachel Berry beat me.

"This is outrageous. They simply can't keep us here!" She crossed her arms and turned to Brittany. "I did not go from dancing with Erik Bruhn to being held against my will in a dive like this." She sniffed. "This is only temporary you understand. Once my leg has healed I won't have to-" she gestured around the room, her arm spinning like a pinwheel. "-subject myself to such things."

I sighed and watched the two. Berry was small, pretty after a fashion. But the girl that towered over her drowned out any beauty she might possess. As the rant continued, Brittany nodded in all the right places. And some of the wrong ones.

I gnawed about half an inch off my upper lip and touched against the metal in my pocket. Thinking back to the week before.

_"What's this?" She was sitting on my desk, her legs crossed and toes tucked behind her heel. Her fingers caressed my wrist._

"A pulsera_," I answered, relishing the tingle as her nail came into contact with my skin. "A bracelet."_

"A- pulsera?_That's so pretty." She traced the heart that the gold framed. "Do you want to trade?"_

I laughed, like fingers across ivory. "I don't give just anyone my corazon."

_"But mine is much more expensive." She said bluntly, but not cruelly. "Tiffany's. I think."_

_"Hmm. Let me think on it." And I was. I was already planning. I was seeing her face looking happy and knowing that I had put that smile there. That smile like a breeze in the middle of a LA heat wave. The only relief I ever got._

_"Ready to go, baby?" The cripple asked. He wasn't a bad guy, I suppose. But I still wanted to wheel him into the Hudson to look for fish._

_"Santana was just teaching me some Spanish!" she said happily. Leaning over the desk she pulled me into a tight hug. "We should go shopping!"_

Too soon it was over. Her embrace was gone. She was moving away.

I'd give anything to feel those arms again.

"Santana Lopez." He tried to focus those eyes on me. Small, beady, and close. As if they were in earnest conversation with each other.

"Jesse St. James." I took a step back, the scent clouding my senses. "Understudying for John Barrymore again, I take it?"

He unzipped his teeth and threw back his head. "You dish it out in spades, don't you, doll?"

"And I'm generous, too."

He leaned in and I leaned back. "You ever thought about movies? You could be the new Velez? I know Harry Cohn, you know."

"No one is touching my hairline." I watched over his swaying shoulder. Berry still had Brittany. "What do you think of all of this?" I said for something to be saying.

"The murder? Shame. She was a pretty gal. Not the type you'd marry of course, but charming on the arm." He leered. "_You_could be charming on the arm."

"Your arms couldn't afford me."

"The rumours are that you aren't exactly expensive." He tilted his head to Karofsky with a green grin. "So why turn your nose up, Ankle?"

I gave a quick, hard wink and stepped closer, braving the fumes. If someone lit a match we'd all go up. "Listen to me, St. James. You might think you're a someone, but that's all passed now. You're a low down punk with his eye on the sky and his face in the gutter-" I smiled, the kind comforting grin of a loving mother. "And I know my way around there. So just play nice, or I will step on your neck if you even _think _of talking to me again. Got me? Ankle?"

I heard a snort to my left and glanced over. Hummel.

"Sorry, I was just—"

"He's all yours." I stepped round him and saw Brittany was now free. She met my eyes and gave a shadow of a smile. I practically bounced in front of her, a giddy excitement in my chest. "This is some scene."

"Yeah," she stared down at the ground. "It's really sad."

I rearranged my expression into one of abject misery. "It really is. She was so young."

"It's a really horrible accident."

"Accident?" A gust of air escaped my nostrils. "It was hardly that."

She shrugged and played with a sliver of gold that hung from her head.

I took a deep breath. "Listen—I ran an errand earlier and—" I reached into my pocket. "Well, I—"

"Santana?" She cut me off. "Can I talk to you? Alone?"

Abrams. He'd done it. Conviction grabbed me by the throat and I had to choke out a breath.

And a dark part of me thought. _Now she can be_mine.

"Can Susan Peters spare you?" I looked over at Abrams who was staring up at the ceiling, his jaw slack. He didn't look the type, but I guess love can drive you to desperate things.

"Who?"

I shook my head and jerked my chin to the side, walking ahead of her to a quieter corner. "He took the side elevator, didn't he?" I said once we alone. Don't worry. His legs work in his favour-they won't be looking too closely-"

"It was me."

A fist sailed through my soul and floored me. "What?"

"I went to her room. She was around Artie. All the time! And I was jealous. It was wrong, but I was! And then she was saying all this stuff and it was so nasty, so I pushed her to make her stop but-"

"But what?"

"She fell." Brittany's eyes found the floor and my heart joined them. "She fell and didn't get up again." I clenched my hands into fists and felt my nails kiss the palm. Rough. Hard. Unrelenting. She came closer to me and my arms took their fill. They were happy. It was all they had ever wanted. But my mind couldn't enjoy it. Because they'd be coming for her soon. The same way I had came, and when they did they wouldn't be slowed down asking for directions. And they wouldn't be gentle. No amount of soft, velvet hair or butter-cream scent could change that. I let her go and my skin screamed at the loss of warmth.

"You don't tell." I said. I grabbed her by the shoulders, my fingers no doubt marking her skin through her clothes.

"But I have to. It's the right thing to do," her lip trembled. "It was me."

"Stop saying that!" I hissed. A flattie saw us and raised an eyebrow. I dropped the hands. "Stop it. No, you didn't."

"But-"

"No. I'm going to fix this." I rose a hand to my hair, dragging at the root. "I'll fix it."

"I don't understand." She shook her head gently. "Please."

I was broken. That simple _please_tore through me like barb wire through silk.

"You were in your room. Showering. The first you heard about Cohen-Chang was when you came to find Abrams. You were shocked."

"That isnt-"

"Damnit, Brittany!" She recoiled as if slapped and I wanted to burn away the moment. "Brittany." I took her by the elbows. "It was a mistake. You didn't mean to do it. An accident."

"Will the police understand?"

I shook my head. I didn't know. "Who will look after-" The name felt kicked from my throat. "-Artie if you go to prison? No, not prison. It would be the _chair_, Brittany."

"No!" Water filled her eyes, making them seem more like the ocean than ever before. "I don't want that!"

"Then lie. Say what I told you to say." My thumb traced a circle into her skin. "And no matter what happens. Don't change it."

"What do you mean?"

I smiled, I wanted to press my lips to her cheek and taste the salt. Feel that cold wet. I didn't dare. Thing like that would be remembered. And I didn't want anything leading back to her.

"Do you trust me?" She nodded, her eyes wide. "I promise you. I'll fix this."

"Santana, wait-"

I turned from her so fast I almost heard the snap of air.

I had to move.

I made my way out of the lobby and ducked through the door. Karofsky and Puck looked like they were getting into it. So engrossed in each other they didn't see me. I stalked to the side elevator, my heels clipping smartly against the marble imitation floor.

Deserted.

Slipping in, I keyed in the dead girl's floor. I watched the numbers climb and felt the moments crawl.

The doors pinged. I stepped out onto the floor my eyes searching for cops, photographers, and journalists. There was no one. God had granted me a favour and gave me an incompetent police force. If this had been one of the fancier hotels on the strip I never even would have made it this far.

I prayed I'd make it a little further.

Taking a deep breath, I stepped into the room. A white sheet was at the centre, stained red at its corner. Crossing quickly I knelt down and pulled back the sheet almost tenderly. I had never seen a dead body before. I could go a lifetime without seeing one again. I stared into her eyes that didn't see me. Eyes that stared into another world. I hoped they liked what they saw there.

"I'm sorry," I said. "I love her. Like you loved Abrams. Like she loves Abrams."

I bit at my lip and pushed back a tear. Crying had never helped before. It wouldn't help me, it wouldn't help Brittany and it sure as hell wasn't going to help Tina Cohen-Chang of Room 19.

"I have to do this," I whispered. I put my hand into my pocket and pulled out the _pulsera_. The one I had brought for Brittany. Except whereas mine was garnet, hers was the same topaz as her eyes. I pressed it to my lips and kissed it goodbye.

Picking up Cohen-Chang's lifeless hand and I pressed the bracelet into her palm. I closed her fingers and heard the clasp catch inside her fist. _One to every day of the week._

I had lied to Puck. It wasn't cheap.

It was priceless.

I left the room, my head on the floor and my heart in the throat. No one noticed me. No one stopped me.

Returning to the lobby, I passed through the crowd, my knuckles grazing their bodies as I went. Life's rejects and losers all here in one place. Fighting to survive. I suppose I was one of them now. But it didn't feel like losing. Not even a little bit.

I took my place at my desk and looked up. Blue found brown again. I nodded and gave a smile. She gave a brave one back.

I guess she got my _corazon_, after all.

**The End.**


End file.
